Barack Obama: My conviction is that those fights need to be fought rig...

I always tell my staff, "Better is good." I'll take better every time, because better is hard.

Barack Obama

staff hard

You can be stylish, and powerful too.

Barack Obama

stylish powerful

What matters is how well we have loved, and what small part we have played in making the lives around us better.

Barack Obama

wells what-matters matter

Call Loretta Lynch for a vote. Get her confirmed. Put her in place. Let her do her job.

Barack Obama

vote jobs

I do think that this whole area of cyber is something that at an international level we have to work on and develop frameworks and international norms so that we don't see a cyber arms race.

Barack Obama

levels race thinking

I do believe that Chancellor Merkel and Germany are a lynchpin in protecting the basic tenets of a liberal, market-based democratic order that has created unprecedented prosperity and security for Europe, but also for the world.

Barack Obama

europe order believe

It's particularly important that we reach out to everybody in our countries, those who feel disaffected, those who feel left behind by globalization and address their concerns in constructive ways as opposed to more destructive ways.

Barack Obama

addresses important country

You have to be organized, that you have to vote even when it's not exciting.

Barack Obama

vote organized exciting

There is a little bit of that schoolyard attitude of, it's one thing for a guy your own size to mouth off to you, but if there's a little guy, you should just smack him around. And it's probably bad advice in the schoolyard. It's certainly not a good way to run a foreign policy because even when you are dealing with a non-peer, militarily, war is complicated.

Barack Obama

running attitude war

The only time I get frustrated with activist criticism is if I have recognized them, and invited them to work with me to figure out how we solve this problem that they're concerned about, and either they don't engage out of the sense of purity - "I'm not going to shake his hand" - or you're not sufficiently prepared so you don't even know what to ask for, or you're not being strategic as an activist and trying to figure out how the process has to work in order for you to get what you want.

Barack Obama

frustrated order hands

Obviously, we've all had disagreements and differences in the past. I suspect we'll have them again in the future. But last night as Americans learned that the United States had carried out an operation that resulted in the capture and death of Osama bin Laden. I think we experienced the same sense of unity that prevailed on 9/11. We were reminded again that there is a pride in what this nation stands for. And what we can achieve that runs far deeper than party, far deeper than politics.

Barack Obama

party pride running

One of the things I think we have to do is make sure that college is affordable for every young person in America. And I also think that we're going to have to rebuild our infrastructure, which is falling behind, our roads, our bridges, but also broadband lines that reach into rural communities. So there are some things that we've got to do structurally to make sure that we can compete in this global economy. We can't shortchange those things. We've got to eliminate programs that don't work, and we've got to make sure that the programs that we do have are more efficient and cost less.

Barack Obama

college fall thinking

We all remember Abraham Lincoln as the leader who saved our Union. Founder of the Republican Party.

Barack Obama

unions party leader

Faith doesn't mean that you don't have doubts.

Barack Obama

moving-on faith letting-go

We now live in a world where the most valuable skill you can sell is knowledge. Revolutions in technology and communication have created an entire economy of high-tech, high-wage jobs that can be located anywhere there's an internet connection. And today, a child in Chicago is not only competing for jobs with one in Boston, but thousands more in Bangalore and Beijing who are being educated longer and better than ever before.

Barack Obama

inspiring jobs children

We don't quit. I don't quit. Let's seize this moment.

Barack Obama

quitting moments

I don't have time to complain. I'm going to press on.

Barack Obama

future-destiny rewards complaining

That is why we fight - in hopes of a day when we no longer need to.

Barack Obama

fighting hope needs

There's no doubt that I'm a better president now than when I first took office. This is not a job where there's a manual, and over time you get a better sense of what's important, what's not, how to see around corners and anticipate problems, as opposed to just managing problems once they've arrived.

Barack Obama

office doubt jobs

I believe that if we stop talking at one another and start talking with one another, we can get a lot done.

Barack Obama

done talking believe

My conviction is that those fights need to be fought right now and can be won. And if in fact we have finite political capital, energy, resources, we need to win those fights.